Sarkozy wants to pump nearly US$7 billion into development of national broadband networks, with the money to be raised from a bond issue called the grand emprunt ("big loan"). The emprunt is a stimulus plan designed to boost the French economy as it pulls out of the worldwide economic crisis. Most of the money will be raised through a bond issue, but the rest will come from large institutions (think: banks) that were bailed out by the French government over the last year and are now repaying their debts.

Other countries like Spain and Finland are aiming for a national baseline of 1Mbps to all households over the next year or two; France wants faster speeds, but over a longer timeframe. And 100Mbps, while it sounds fast now, won't be particularly quick in a decade. The good news, though, is that the only way to reach such speeds in France is probably through fiber (Europe not generally having a real robust cable infrastructure), and fiber is easily capable of speed upgrades.

Governments across the world are now explicitly recognizing the value of broadband as a public utility that should be available to all citizens. Spain and Finland are using a "universal service" funding model to subsidize more expensive locations, while countries like Australia are taking a "we'll build it ourselves" approach to a national fiber backbone. The UK is encouraging incumbent last-mile operator OpenReach to roll out "open access" fiber. As for the US, the government has done little to date apart from funding some school and library Internet access, though that may change at least a bit when the first National Broadband Plan is rolled out early in 2010.

America could easily upstage France by building 1 GigE to each household/business, at a low cost,with little public investment through municipal public owned utilities building fiber to the block networks connecting every household/business in the urban area wired or wireless. Each block node would have a single dual band wireless N AP and ports for 1 GigE copper ethernet. Service charges would be $20 for wireless and $150 for wired and a couple of bucks a month for O&M.

Next year 802.11ad at 60 Ghz 6 GigE will be coming on line that may be able to connect an entire block up without cabling. WiGig has annouced 7 GigE with beamforming so who knows.

Where the city owned the power distribution as well costs would be trivial if the ethernet pipe was combined with the communication requirements of smart meters.

Smart Phone/ATA based VOIP (Google Voice or City network access) and basic cable (local/Canadian channels) would cost a trivial amount

The city network could grow like an amoeba block by block connecting subscribers for a service fee or higher first year monthly payment sufficient to cover network costs to that neighborhood requiring an insignificant investment from the city. Costs would be low enough that close to a 100% penetration should be achievable. If costs for some unforeseen reason spiraled out of control or subscribers stubbornly stuck to Big Telecom the city would know about it after the first neighborhood was hooked up - risk is zilch. The easy peasy approach would be to start in areas with lots of apartment buildings.

The first neighborhood hooked up, would be called a test network to minimize political risk. It would take a city crew a week or two to wire up a neighborhood to the block level (with wifi) with a few thousand dollars worth of staple to the pole ADSS cable, equipment boxes, and access points.

Service charges would be $20 for wireless and $150 for wired and a couple of bucks a month for O&M.

If I get the access password from someone on the block I'd saved the money without paying a penny to the Wifi provider. There is no save bet for the Wifi provider to correct their money. And they know we'd tried everything to get free Wifi even it only costs them $20 a month. Unlike cable you must run the lines to get Internet.

What I'm trying to say is Wifi is good but how they make money off of it?

It's actually only EURO 2 billion going to the broadband pledge. The rest of the EURO 4.5 billion money is going to other IT projects like digitizing books, creating server farms to host them, upgrading libraries and "promoting the development of innovative content and new uses through public-private partnerships in intelligent networks, teleworking, telemedicine, health, government, justice and education." Still a pretty healthy number for a nation of it's size.

Should also mention that France Telecom stopped it's FFTX roll-out a year or two ago. So the money is probably being given to coax them back to installing fiber.

Anybody who handed out his access code would find he couldn't log on when somebody else is logged on. Finally multiple logon attempts would be tracked and the account suspended. Mac addresses could also be used.

Originally posted by Sandman_1:And here we are in the USA dropping like a rock while the rest of the world leaves us behind in technology. Aint life grand?

Where was the quote in the article about the US "dropping like a rock"?...I must've missed that, somehow...

And $7B (even if we disregard the fact that as the article states it's "really" $2b instead of $7B), either in Euros or dollars, is a drop in the ocean compared to the total cost of national Internet system roll outs--which of course are paid for not by the respective governments in these locales, but by the corporations and companies that pay to roll them out using non-government funds--eg., non-government investment money. The money the government ponies up is likely 3-5% of the total, at maximum, of what such systems actually cost to roll out, but for some strange reason it's government money that gets 95%-98% of the publicity, and the corporations, companies, and groups who actually foot the bill get the rest of whatever publicity is left--usually very negative publicity that is always mouthed before considered.

I've always thought it would be nice to at least try and acknowledge the money that the various companies have laid out to bring us the Internet as we know it--but even the fact that it is private enterprise--not the government--who brought us "Internet for the public" in the first place is seldom acknowledged except by those who know what they are talking about.

But I certainly feel as if the US is "dropping like a rock" in the area of nuclear power, while France is nuclear-power dependent, relying on it for at least 85% of France's electricity needs. If many in the US government weren't scared to death of nuclear power, and many in Congress didn't have to throw salt over their shoulders when they talk about it, we could do a lot about that particular disparity, I suppose. For exactly the same reasons, the US could become fairly oil-independent, too, but we don't because Congress is superstitious about that as well.

I'll just be glad when they deport all of us back to Xerox 7 in the Spokane sector where we came from! One great thing I've heard about our home planet is that the greenies deported all of their lawyers from Xerox 7 ages ago, and I certainly shouldn't have to tell you *where* those deported lawyers all wound up!

Uh, I don't care about fiber, just give me faster speeds with the current infrastructure even... cable and DSL are well capable of doing faster speeds with approximately the same cost, but the ISPs have a government-granted monopoly in way too many areas and so can charge whatever the hell they want, so long as they don't cause a riot. And they don't want to raise the speeds, because why should they if they have a monopoly? They can milk more customers on the same lines for the same highway robbery prices. If we actually had them line-share, now, THAT would make them raise the speeds

Personally, I would rather have faster upload speeds. I would even sacrifice faster download speed for better upload speed. Uploading family photos to whatever, is already a test in patience. 50/5 speed or 20/20? I would rather go for the 20/20 personally. Fiber at least is full duplex.

@bartfat

I agree. If there is no competition, then there is no incentive to upgrade their network. They will fit as many as they can on 1 pipe as possible because upgrading the system digs into that profit margin.

Originally posted by superslav223:So would you like your tax dollars to fund fiber across desolate states so we can be higher on a list? You want to spend billions so Farmer Bob can watch porn in HD?

I'm really sick of this 'we must be like the europeans' line of linking. It's a rejection of critical thinking for fashion based thinking.

Yes...actually I do support my tax dollars going towards laying fiber everywhere like that and I don't even live in one of the desolate states. Also, if you are the type of critical thinker that likes to think big and beyond those silly Europeans making their silly fiber fashion statements then let's bring WiFi to all of these places while we are at it.

Originally posted by Sandman_1:Personally, I would rather have faster upload speeds. I would even sacrifice faster download speed for better upload speed. Uploading family photos to whatever, is already a test in patience. 50/5 speed or 20/20? I would rather go for the 20/20 personally. Fiber at least is full duplex.

Do you mean symmetric? DSL and Cable are both full duplex, and they can be symmetric as well.

@ sethdryl You say that every block would have a fiber node and off that would be wireless ap + copper ethernet. So how would you deal with the 100 meter limitation of the copper and the short range of a regular old ap? Not to mention the fact that existing copper will not support gige so that would have to be replaced and a hell of a lot of fiber would have to be put down in order to serve all these nodes. I think you are kidding yourself of the cost of such a network.

So would you like your tax dollars to fund fiber across desolate states so we can be higher on a list? You want to spend billions so Farmer Bob can watch porn in HD?

I'm really sick of this 'we must be like the europeans' line of linking. It's a rejection of critical thinking for fashion based thinking.

Ok let me ask you a question then, do you like our wonderful Interstate highway system that we have today? Imagine life without it. It would really suck wouldn't it. Anyway, I see the need to do what we did back then with the Interstate system. We need to build a information super highway so we can stay relevant and compete with other nations. With your logic, the Interstate system wouldn't of been built because it wouldn't of been cost prohibitive.

quote:

Originally posted by Insta_AxE_Toast

Do you mean symmetric? DSL and Cable are both full duplex, and they can be symmetric as well.

Yes, and that may be so, but I don't see it happening in markets that offer that speed for cable or dsl service to residential customers. FIOS and other fiber ISP's are the only ones that are offering comparable upload speeds that I know of.

Originally posted by Sandman_1:What I meant was the fact we are like 15th or 17th place in fiber deployment ,compared to the rest of the world, and dropping.

So would you like your tax dollars to fund fiber across desolate states so we can be higher on a list? You want to spend billions so Farmer Bob can watch porn in HD?

I'm really sick of this 'we must be like the europeans' line of linking. It's a rejection of critical thinking for fashion based thinking.

In the same way that building our nation's interstate highway system paved the way (no pun intended) for growth and private industry (UPS, Greyhound, Waffle House!), an investment like this could ease the way for tremendous private growth in the digital world. So instead of Farmer Bob watching porn in HD, he'll have the capability to create his own HD porn kingdom out of his barn/home office.

@ sethdryl You say that every block would have a fiber node and off that would be wireless ap + copper ethernet. So how would you deal with the 100 meter limitation of the copper and the short range of a regular old ap? Not to mention the fact that existing copper will not support gige so that would have to be replaced and a hell of a lot of fiber would have to be put down in order to serve all these nodes. I think you are kidding yourself of the cost of such a network.

One fiber node a block would put 99% of households and business within 100 meters of a node. POE repeaters could extend the rare exception to up to 500 meters. Cat 5E outdoor costs less than 10 cents a foot and in a mass build a muni power crew could do a drop a man hour. - well under $100 one time a drop. AP's have a much longer range outdoors but may require a $20 repeater in the front window to spread the signal indoors.

Lots of fiber is required but its spread out amongst so many customers using Traffic engineering that the cost per customer is one time $20 to the node. Its been costed out block by block for Seattle. Remember that cost of nailing the fiber to pole is a lot greater than the cost of the fiber at the neighborhood level where most costs are incurred.

@ sethdryl You say that every block would have a fiber node and off that would be wireless ap + copper ethernet. So how would you deal with the 100 meter limitation of the copper and the short range of a regular old ap? Not to mention the fact that existing copper will not support gige so that would have to be replaced and a hell of a lot of fiber would have to be put down in order to serve all these nodes. I think you are kidding yourself of the cost of such a network.

One fiber node a block would put 99% of households and business within 100 meters of a node. POE repeaters could extend the rare exception to up to 500 meters. Cat 5E outdoor costs less than 10 cents a foot and in a mass build a muni power crew could do a drop a man hour. - well under $100 one time a drop. AP's have a much longer range outdoors but may require a $20 repeater in the front window to spread the signal indoors.

Lots of fiber is required but its spread out amongst so many customers using Traffic engineering that the cost per customer is one time $20 to the node. Its been costed out block by block for Seattle. Remember that cost of nailing the fiber to pole is a lot greater than the cost of the fiber at the neighborhood level where most costs are incurred.

Who says that this will be going on a pole? Plenty of areas use buried cable. For the sake of argument I will assume that it is a strictly aerial environment.

For your pricing of cat5e outdoor is that aerial capable cable, or just run of the mill outdoor cable? Not to mention that I doubt you will get gige speeds over cat5e especially outdoors. Do not forget to figure in the cable length of going up and down the pole and other quirky cable routing issues. So now you are under 100 meters to each residence, so you will need ever more fiber nodes.

You say one hour for a drop, is that just stringing it up and terminating? Also would you be stringing it all the way from the node? If so is will be much much more time than that.

Honestly if it were really that cheap and easy to do it would be done already. You would not see DSL & Cable.

Anybody who handed out his access code would find he couldn't log on when somebody else is logged on. Finally multiple logon attempts would be tracked and the account suspended. Mac addresses could also be used.

That's bad business module. What if I have more than one computers in my households that wanted to access the net at the same time we couldn't? I would never sign up with that service for any amount of fees not even for $20 a month. Cable doesn't do that.

A bit of background: The only reason France has a pretty good Internet service is that the ISP market is (or has been) pretty competitive. The French state, on the other hand, has a long history of wasting taxpayers' money. The project has some grand purpose (to show the president's grandeur), will finance some big national state-owned company (direct subsidy is a no-no under European law) and will achieve nothing. Probably a free subsidy to FT/Orange...

If this is a power company it's pretty simple. Just go out and look, believe me I did, 99% of drops within a typical pole wired city block fit.

Underground areas are typically apartments so one drop serves a lot of customers. HPNA, new 60Ghz wireless, or Powerline units could serve the building.

In underground residential areas, you'd have to to experiment with a portable trencher/borer. It would be fast if you did a lot of drops at once. You may have to settle for new 60 Ghz or Powerline units at a lower speed.

Cable requirements would depend on local and state regulations. You would be buying miles of it and the average drop is around 50 meters. Not a huge part of the cost.

Odd that you would consider outdoors a limiting factor on GigE speeds - no technical reason for it. In any case I doubt the few that had to settle with 100 mbs would have anything to complain about. And if we double the fiber nodes the $20 node cost increases to $30 per sub so what. Fiber drop cable ADSS is about 10 cents a foot in quantity same as CAT 5E but more expensive equipment is required. If the customer wanted to pay extra it would still be cheap.

Shouldn't take much time, if you are doing a bunch at once using the same equipment all the time. Where I live both the phone and cable company charge one hour no material charge to install a cable drop and generally they are done before the hour ends. Remember only one truck roll to a neighborhood doing the same thing many times a day.

DSL and cable are there because the companies are making 2000% profit on broadband at super slow speeds with almost no investment per sub. Time Warner bragged about it in an annual report. Corrupt politicians let them get away with it.